An old TV commercial of a smoking dog is falsely attributed to the Maharaja of Rewa. - FACTLY
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
February 21, 2024
A video of a dog appearing to smoke a cigarette has been spreading across social media sites, with a claim that the dog belongs to the royal residence of Raja Prabal Pratap Pritam of Rewa State, Madhya Pradesh. Through this fact-check article, we will explore the facts behind these claims.
Claim: The viral video of a smoking dog is from the royal residence of Raja Prabal Pratap Pritam of Rewa State of Madhya Pradesh.
Fact: The video is an old television commercial from an Anti-smoking campaign by ydoyouthink.com. Hence, the claim made in the post is False.
To investigate the claim, a reverse image search was performed using keyframes from the viral video. This search led us to several old YouTube posts (here and here), some as old as 17 years old, that feature the original version of the video.
In this original version, the dog’s owner calls the dog, named Bennet, for dinner. Instead of responding, Bennet takes a puff of the cigarette and states, “Hey, I am a dog, what’s your excuse?” The video concludes with a voiceover asking, “Can anybody tell us why smoking isn’t stupid?” and a text reference to the website ydoyouthink.com.
Further search led us to more commercials from ydoyouthink.com posted on YouTube (here, here, and here), all seemingly part of an anti-smoking campaign.
This presumption was confirmed by a forum post on cursedcommercials.fandom.com, which refers to the smoking dog video as “A funny television PSA from the anti-smoking organisation YDoUThink.”
Moreover, the Maharaja of Rewa State, Maharaja Pushpraj Singh, denied the claim in an interview with vishvasnews.com, firmly establishing that the smoking dog video has no connection to the royal residence of Raja Prabal Pratap Pritam of Rewa State, Madhya Pradesh.
To sum up, the dog in the viral video does not belong to the royal residence of Raja Prabal Pratap Pritam of Rewa State, Madhya Pradesh, but is instead featured in an old ad for an anti-smoking campaign by ydoyouthink.com.